I am not my bumper sticker
My car displays two bumper stickers, one plain blue one showing my support for the Obama-Biden ticket and the other the iconic “Hope” image of Obama’s face in red, white, and blue. I had hoped to find one that said “Progress” because I’ve always found “hope” to be either hokey or just too heart-on-the-sleeve to resonate with me. But the Hope sticker was available, given to me by a friend, so it’s taped to the inside of my car facing out the back windshield. Obama-Biden lawn signed are in front of my house and my office. I even have campaign buttons on my child’s school backpack and dangling from my purse. I didn’t want to leave anything up to the imagination or get drawn into a conversation with someone who assumed that my vote was up for grabs. With all my “flair”, I think it’s safe to say that I’ve accomplished that.
Outing myself this way wasn’t just in the hope of convincing others to vote for Obama. In all stages of the primary and election season, I have needed to commit myself to my candidate(s) by (at minimum) a bumper sticker and donations. It’s my external ritual for the decision to support a candidate.
Unlike the story spun by Ashley Todd, the McCain campaign volunteer who claimed to be beaten, robbed, and sexually assaulted because of her political bumper sticker, I’ve never experienced anything negative because of the few pieces of flair on my car. The only thing that came close was a big pickup truck passing me aggressively on Pico Boulevard, revving it’s engine as it passed and swerving too close for comfort. A McCain-Palin sticker was fixed to the middle of the back window.
Other than that, I live in solid Obama country – one of the leftmost communities, geographically and politically, on the Left Coast. I almost feel sorry for the sparse showing of McCain supporters willing to put a lawn sign out or a sticker on their cars. Where I live, the McCain supporters who feel strongly enough to display their politics are a handful of elderly people and others who live on the fringes of fancy neighborhoods. The cars with McCain stickers are usually American sedans – old Cadillacs and other cars I associate with grandparents. Fear permeates all. The houses are the poorly kept ones, or the the ones that could use an overhaul, or the ones that appear to have gates, hedges, and walls that seem designed to keep everyone out in case a zombie virus hits Los Angeles and the only safe haven is in their fortress.
“Hope” is growing on me. I like having a red, white, and blue sticker on my car because, despite what Sarah Palin and her ilk say about city-dwelling Democrats like me, I am proud of my country. If Obama does win the election, I know that it will be one of his priorities to restore our international standing so that we can hold our head up high and remember the better parts of our legacy as Americans as we undo the damage we have done to others and in our own eyes during the last eight years.
Why do I have the sticker taped rather than stuck permanently to my car? For one thing, I want to keep the sticker. It’s beautiful and worth preserving, maybe as a keepsake for one of my children. Long after the election I want to be able to remember this incredible, optimistic moment, when despite forgotten wars on two fronts so many of us stood together to take back our democracy. And when the election is over, I want to take the sticker off and go back to being a person who doesn’t avoid conversations with Republicans.
